As we gather feedback from stakeholders, you will be able to see it here.
Feedback about Marine Protected Areas
0 posts Why do you think Marine Protected Areas are a good idea?
3 posts Do you have any concerns about Marine Protected Areas?
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
At a recent club discussion about the proposed MPA or MCZs a very good question was asked of me, as i was the one saying that we should be engaging with the authorities as stakeholders. The question was simply "if we have identified an area where we currently fish, as a club, does that mean that we have now surrendered that as an MPA because it shows that there are fish there and therefore the anti angling groups would say protect the fish" If however an area has not been highlighted does that mean that it will not be afforded sanctuary under the scheme as it would tend to indicate a lack of fish?
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
No. The main purpose of the mapping work is to identify which sea areas are important to sea anglers, to divers, sailors, fishermen and other groups. This information will be used by your representatives on the Steering Group to plan Marine Conservation Zones in a way that minimises impacts to your activities. If your Steering Group representative knows which areas are important to you, he or she can use this information in negotiations. If an area is suggested as an MCZ for scientific reasons, and there appears to be no human activities in that area, then it is much more likely to be agreed to by the Steering Group and subsequently be recommended to Government advisors for protection.
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
Thanks for that, I'll print off the question and reply and give the feedback to the club on our next meeting. If the steering group coordinator, of whom you mention, would wish to contact me, it may give even more credence to the role.
Feedback about Finding Sanctuary
0 posts What do you like about Finding Sanctuary?
0 posts Is there any information you would like to see added to the webGIS?
5 posts How can we improve what we are doing?
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
in order for any organisation to have credence it is important that information is both accurate and up to date. therefore when one visits the Sanctuary web site it is perplexing to find out of date information being displayed as news! pleas either keep the site up to date, moving items from the future to the past when they have occurred or scrap the site. I tell people to get on the site to gain info not to then come back to me and tell me it is "dross".
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Yes, I agree with you. We have just had a content management system set up so that we can update the website ourselves instead of having to go through the website design company each time something needs to be changed. I have updated the news and events items and over the next few weeks I will be update the whole site to make sure it is factual.
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
Thanks for the feedback, hopefully now the site will be kept up to date and therefore valid.
Tom Shearwater, Truro, Cornwall wrote:
I fully support the creation of MPA/MCZ areas in the waters of the south west and have every sympathy for the need to protect marine habitats from the effects of destructive practices. However, I have found information given on this process to be vague and devoid of satisfactory information on areas being considered for MPA status. I imagine that this vagueness has caused great worry among stakeholders who will be concerned that large stretches of inshore waters in the south west will be declared off-limits putting livelihoods at risk and criminalising recreational anglers, divers, kayakers, spearfishermen and other stakeholders who catch the odd fish. In this regard I feel that communication has been poor. Given that these zones have been considered for some time, and the 2 year period before they become law is ticking away, Finding Sanctuary, DEFRA and your scientific consultants need to be far more candid regarding the number of MPAs proposed and their possible sites - even if it is speculative at this stage. Being guarded will only serve to alienate stakeholders and make them feel like their needs are not being considered in the planning process. I sincerely hope that recreational users of close inshore waters in the south west will not be penalised by the creation of these areas which really need the backing of the public and those that use the water. We all know what practices cause the most destruction to marine biomass. Joe Bloggs with his fishing rod should not be criminalised.
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Tom, Thank you for your feedback.
You’ve raised a couple of important issues here and hopefully I can give you a helpful response.
Firstly just to clarify, there are two processes occurring at the same time to identify different types of marine protected areas in the south-west. Natural England is currently consulting on proposed Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) in the south-west – these are specific sites to be designated under European legislation. There is an official consultation on their website identifying site boundaries. It is important to note that for SACs site selection boundaries must be based completely on scientific evidence (i.e.socio-economic factors cannot taken into consideration). The Finding Sanctuary project is responsible for developing recommendations for Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs), a new designation introduced through the Marine and Coastal Access Act.
Ultimately the new MCZs and new SACs, together with existing protected sites will form the network of marine protected areas that the UK Government is committed to creating by 2012.
There is no information currently available about proposed Marine Conservation Zones because none have been suggested by the Finding Sanctuary Steering Group yet. We are still awaiting official guidance to be issued by Government agencies. We hope this will set out which species and habitats are required to be protected, and other parameters such as minimum distance between areas, representativity etc. We have been told the official guidance will be issued by June 2010. Planning Marine Conservation Zones without this is not possible. However, in the meantime we have developed a set of interim guidelines for the Steering Group to work with. We developed this interim guidance as we felt the Steering Group needed to make progress on planning sites, given that the deadline for recommendations is looming. This interim guidance is available on our website under General Resources.
As you say, it’s so important that marine protected areas are supported by the public and the people who have to live with them. This is precisely why we are attempting to do things differently in this process. We do not believe these decisions should be made by authorities behind closed doors and then imposed on people. We believe that the people that stand to be affected by these decisions should be involved in making them- after all they are the ones that have to live with the marine protected areas, and they won’t work without their support. We have set up the Steering Group which will make recommendations to Government on the location of MCSZ for the south-west. They will also recommend what level of protection each MCZ should have i.e. which activities should be restricted in them. The Steering Group consists of over 40 people who represent commercial and recreational sea users, landowners, government agencies to name a few. You can see the full list of representatives here. We have also set up local groups in each county in the south-west to ensure that proposed MCZs have the local support and backing that they need to be successful.
We take very seriously your suggestion that we are being guarded in our approach. One of our key principles is to be open and transparent. All our Steering Group meeting reports are available on our website in the Resources section. Our latest Steering Group meeting (11th Feb) report will be added shortly. We also share all the data we are gethering with the public via our Interactive Map, unless the license does not allow us to publish this data. If you come to one of our drop-in days and meet our staff I think you will find that we are open, frank and honest in our approach. We are holding two more drop-in days in Cornwall and I hope you can make it to one of them. The details of all of our meetings are on our Events page.
Unfortunately we are still dealing with uncertainties and these are very frustrating not just for stakeholders but also for us. We understand that this is going to be uncomfortable at this stage in the process, but we also believe that it is right to engage people early on, before decisions have been made. Recreational anglers, divers, kayakers and spearfishermen are all represented on the Steering Group and will be part of making these important decisions.
Thank you.
